


lord, what can the harvest hope for

by litbynosun



Category: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: Canon Disabled Character, Codependency, F/F, Time Loop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-10
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-14 23:34:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18062348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/litbynosun/pseuds/litbynosun
Summary: (but for the care of the reaper man?)Homura's cared for one thing in the entirety of her existence. She's shaped time around one person.What happens when that person shapes the universe around a concept that Homura is only a small part of? Earthshattering love is only nice when you're the one loving.





	lord, what can the harvest hope for

**Author's Note:**

> This quote (GNU Terry Pratchett, yes) has been in my head for days, as well as a Tumblr post on letting sapphic relationships be messy and powerful.  
> And, well, this relationship has reshaped the world not once but twice, right? 
> 
> 999 words, just for fun.

Homura's universe has only a single center. It has a yawning emptiness that fills all else but the gravitational pull of one girl, two red ribbons, a swish of a pink skirt. Some cycles Madoka trusts her less, isn't willing to let a dark, quiet stranger follow her around, but even then Homura has a sense of where she is at all times. It's like a lighthouse, this knowledge. It's like a black hole absorbing everything else in existence. 

Every beat of Homura's damaged heart sings it, Ma do ka, Ma do ka. Every time their hands intertwine her skin flames like her own name. With each person (and witch, she could not think of witches as people until at least the twenty fifth cycle) she kills, they bleed for her, for Madoka.

Homura loves one thing, but Madoka is in love with the world. Homura has learned to accept that, as her Love would not be herself without that indiscriminate passion. But it does make it difficult to keep her alive.

She shoots another witch-who-was-Sayaka in what passes for a head, sets bombs alight and Madoka weeps for the loss. 

“Homura-chan,” she says, falling into her weapon-laden arms. Homura dematerializes her clock-shield to hold her better. “Homura-chan, I don't know what to do.”

“It's okay,” Homura soothes. It is not okay. She strokes Madoka's hair, breathes in her scent. It's sweat and blood, and Homura aches for her.

In the distance, not far geographically but far in the way that matters, Kyouko rages, volatile.

Homura will have to deal with that later, but she has time. She has all the time in the world.

Some cycles Madoka kisses her and her tongue tastes like strawberries, a little fizzle like ramune. Sometimes they will even go on dates that don't get interrupted and Madoka smiles like she's forgotten the pain they all carry with them. Homura does not think that this will happen in this cycle. Everything is going wrong, their quintet down two members, and when Sayaka falls Kyouko has always followed.

She has never seen a cycle go right, and half of that is how her friends/ enemies/ soldiers relate to each other. 

She wants Madoka to sink her teeth into Homura's lips, a punishment and a promise, but that too has never occurred. Her mouth, like her breath, is sweet. 

When Homura’s heart, too damaged to fully heal even with magic, thrums and stutters, she wants Madoka to trace the scar down the center of her chest. In the stories love is clean, but in the stories so are surgical incisions. It is love that causes arrhythmia, love and a corrupted soul gem. 

She supports Madoka as she weeps, wanders over to the egg that was once Sayaka’s Self. She is not exactly furtive as she uses it to purify  _ her _ Self but does not flaunt it either. There is no room for sentiment in Homura’s goals.

There will always be another Sayaka. There will always be another Madoka, too.

* * *

 

Madoka has just crushed Homura's life's work under her ribboned and immaculate heel. She is being kind, her face says, as she systematically demolishes any bit of progress Homura has ever made towards the only goal Homura has ever held.

Her hands are icy marble. She holds Homura in her arms, and finally traces her fingers down Homura's naked chest, across the scar where the doctors sawed through her breastbone to reach her heart.

There is no skin on skin. Homura is naked, desperate, grasping. Madoka's gloved hands cradle her as if she is a child -- she does not touch her as a lover might. Sometimes during the loops Homura found herself thinking that Madoka is very young -- only fourteen, when Homura herself was nineteen, twenty-one, twenty-three as time wound its way onward. Now Homura is twenty-three and Madoka's eyes hold thousands of years in every shift of rose to magenta. 

Loving Madoka is like having a cardiac condition. Her vision blurs and flickers with black spots when she moves too fast, or when she forgets to blink while watching Madoka move. Her freezing hands tremble and shift from colorless to blotchy purple when Madoka entwines their hands together, but often they do it of their own accord. Dizzying, pounding waves echo through Homura's limbs as her heartbeat radiates through her entire body, and she cannot pick out the reason she's so attuned to the swish of blood through her veins. 

Some cycles she does not steal medicine from the pharmacy she used to pick up prescriptions from. It's a drain on her magic, sure, but it's also profoundly uncomfortable. Most cycles she does, because it's hard to fight well when your head is spinning.

But now, in this eternal present, Madoka's hands set Homura down gently, gently. She has gifted her a ribbon, like a lady bequeathing a favor to a knight. 

She does not seem to understand how cruel she is being.

It is not that Homura is selfish, or jealous, or anything else. Well, she is all of that, but not enough that she would cause suffering without due reason. Everyone she hurt has been for a purpose.

Madoka has stomped that purpose under her white-booted foot. 

You see, Homura is special to Madoka, she knows. But they have such different ideas on sacrifice. Homura sacrificed the world she loved, or multiple worlds, for the love of Madoka. And Madoka sacrificed Homura for the world.

When wraiths eventually come into being Homura fights as hard as she can. She's not about to give up. She's never been willing to give up. Magical girls, as long as they remain so, exist purely to  _ help _ . 

But she is always waiting for that final battle. A gloved hand will cradle her as she dies, unmourned and forgotten, and every beat of her heart is expectant.

She has hope that Madoka will come for her soon. She does not know the face that belongs to the name. 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm @coldwind-shiningstars on Tumblr, come say hey!


End file.
